But at the same time, the internet is also a huge place – and
building a decent searching algorithm can’t
bethat hard, right?

This week’s chart is a bit mind-boggling, because it makes the
case that Google is even more dominant than you may have guessed.
Between all Google features and the search giant’s YouTube
subsidiary, more than 90% of all internet searches are taking
place through the company.

THE HARD DATA

According toJumpshot(viaSparkToro), a marketing analytics firm that
licenses anonymous ClickStream data from hundreds of millions of
users, about 62.6% of all searches online are through Google’s
core function.

But that’s just the beginning, as that number doesn’t include
other Google functions like image search or Google Maps, or
properties such as YouTube:

Visual Capitalist

Together, Google holds onto an impressive 90.8% market share of
web, mobile, and in-app searches – though it should be noted that
the above source does not include iPhone data at scale yet.

THE GOOGLE-OPOLY

How does Google keep up such a massive market share, and why
can’t a real competitor in search emerge?

The answer has to do with platforms and apps. Google’s strategy
is to go where the users are, and to ensure that wherever they
go, a Google search is not hard to do.

Over a decade ago, this meant being the home page on every
internet browser – but more recently, it’s taken the form of
internet browser market share (Chrome), mobile OS market share
(Android), owning the dominant video platform (YouTube), and even
venturing into your dwelling withGoogle Home.

As a result of these efforts, whenever users are searching,
Google has never been far away.

LOW BIDS FROM COMPETITION

There are competitors that dare to pluck away at Google’s market
share in search andad revenue.

Microsoft’s Bing is the most known one, and it has the advantage
of being integrated into Microsoft products all over the globe.
Meanwhile, DuckDuckGo is another name worth mentioning – the
privacy-focused search engine doesn’t have anywhere near the same
kind of financial backing as Microsoft, but it does differentiate
its product considerably.

Yet, here’s a picture of U.S. search ad revenues. Bing is small,
but others are smaller. DuckDuckGo doesn’t even register.

Visual Capitalist

Why can no one match Google?

Part of the reason lies in the math. Google operates at an insane
level, processing 3.5 billion searchesper
day. To get millions of people to try a different search
algorithm is expensive – and to get them to keep that behavior
permanently is even more expensive.

The only way such change becomes feasible is if a product comes
out that is 10x better than Google, and at this point, such an
event seems unlikely – at least in the current ecosystem.